Protection of Natural Heritage: A Conservation Criminology Perspective

Abstract

Conservation criminology is an emerging interdisciplinary field which integrates elements of criminology, environmental science, and risk management in order to provide a realistic framework for the analysis of the problems related to conservation of natural resources and biodiversity. It comprises broad categories of environmental crimes and risks, including, but not limited to illegal lodging, illicit wildlife trade, corruption in environmental matters and ecoterrorism. The new international and regional developments indicate an increasing threat to natural resources conservation from criminal networks which seek to increase their profits through hard to detect and reduced penal liability activities, resorting to environmental crimes in order to complement their illicit activities or even as a main operation. The impact of such crimes is cumulative and persistent, having a twofold negative effect, on environment, mostly reflected in depletion or contamination of resources, and on local sustainable development, reducing opportunities for tourism, eco-agriculture, or other environmental low-impact activities. This paper argues that conservation criminology is well suited and could provide valuable insights in the analysis of the risks to safeguarding natural heritage, through integration into environmental governance, specifically for the regions which are confronted with threats generated by criminal networks.